Items tagged with ethereum
It appears that illegal electricity theft and cryptocurrency mining go hand in hand, as the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) reported that it has shut down a massive crypto-farm stealing electricity. Comprised of thousands of consoles and hundreds of graphics cards, the farm was seized from an old warehouse professionally rigged for the illicit activities. In the city of Vinnytsia, a group of crypto miners has been accused of “theft of water, electricity or thermal energy through its unauthorized use,” by the SBU. According to the report, “electricity meters that did not show a real energy consumption” were used to steal upwards of $259,000 in electricity monthly for the...
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In early May, MSI delivered its first Ethereum mining card from NVIDIA’s Cryptocurrency Mining Processor (CMP HX) GPU family. The headless card was called the CMP 30HX Miner XS and is based on the GeForce GTX 1660 Super GPU. This time around, however, MSI is moving up the performance ladder in the CMP family with the launch of the CMP 50HX Miner. Whereas the CMP 30HX has an Ethereum hash rate of just 26 MH/sec, the CMP 50HX is more performant at 45 MH/sec. According to MSI, the CMP 50HX Miner features 3,584 CUDA cores, a base clock of 1,350MHz, a boost clock of 1,545MHz, and 10GB of GDDR6 memory running at 14 Gbps on a 320-bit bus. It’s reported that the CMP 50HX is based on the TU102...
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In May, China began a cryptocurrency crackdown that kicked off a mass exodus of digital miners from the country. Since then, this crackdown has continued and even been reaffirmed as of late with several major mines' shutdown. This has put cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum into a tailspin, and it is hard to tell where this will end. In the past two months, Bitcoin has lost over 40% of its value, and some investors are rightfully concerned. With this loss, analysts report that Bitcoin has formed a "death cross," which means the average price over the last 50 days fell below its 200-day moving average. According to Investopedia, this is sometimes viewed as a signal that a massive sell-off...
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NVIDIA is hoping that applying a hash rate limiter to some of its graphics cards will help get more units in the hands of actual PC gamers, rather than miners, who the company is serving with CMP HX parts. The newly minted GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is one of those cards. It is not a great option for mining Ethereum (relative to the card's cost), and it looks like the hash rate limiter nerfs a few other cryptocurrencies as well. Hopefully this attempt works out better than it did for the GeForce RTX 3060. NVIDIA attempted to gimp mining performance for that card as well, but the effort was quickly undone when a developer driver that removed the hash rate limiter found its way to the web. It did not...
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We're just days away from the official unveiling of the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti, which means that leaks are occurring more frequently. Earlier this morning, we were made privy to the [alleged] full specifications of the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. We're now learning about how its Ethereum mining performance has been nerfed compared to previous Ampere graphics cards. While the GeForce RTX 3090 currently sits at the top of the stack in NVIDIA's Ampere lineup with its 10,496 CUDA cores and 24GB GDDR6X memory, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is no slouch. According to GPU-Z, it features 10,240 CUDA cores, 12GB GDDR6X memory, a base clock of 1365MHz, and a boost clock of 1665MHz. As such, the GeForce...
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NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3060 was the first Ampere graphics card to introduced a cryptocurrency limiter. In early testing, the limiter gradually reduced the hash rate of the GPU arm around 41 MH/s to 26 MH/s or lower, in the hopes of making them less attractive to Ethereum miners. However, enthusiasts quickly found multiple workarounds to defeat the limiter, restoring its original mining performance. NVIDIA is back again with Lite Hash Rate (LHR) GPUs, and the folks over at Expreview have gotten their hands on the Zotac GeForce RTX 3060 LHR Apocalypse GOC, which is exclusive to the Chinese market. According to the site, which performed a wide variety of real-world gaming and synthetic benchmarks,...
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It has been a tumultuous week for cryptocurrencies as many of the major coins have taken a nosedive off a cliff, such as Bitcoin sitting at $34,000 at the time of writing. As this is happening, many crypto exchanges, like Binance and Coinbase, are feeling the pressure and may be struggling for it. Citing issues like network congestion and partial outages, these companies temporarily paused transactions, either by choice or involuntarily but have now restored some service. Earlier this morning, Coinbase faced “intermittent downtime” on its platforms, tweeting that some customers were “experiencing some issues with logging in, seeing their balances, and trading.” The initial...
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Hey, good news everyone—the GPU shortage is over! Just kidding, you still can't find a graphics card in stock (not from a first-party seller at a fair price, that is). I know, I know, what an insensitive intro, my apologies. However, there is actually some good news, related to GPUs. Ethereum is aiming to become much more power efficient, and a key change to its operations could dramatically reduce the demand for graphics cards. That is the big upside in theory, anyway. Ethereum is embarking on a transition from a proof-of-work (PoW) to a proof-of-stake (PoS) model. What exactly does that mean? Well, the main benefit outlined in a blog post announcing the change is a massive 99.95 percent...
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Gigabyte yesterday jumped the gun when it comes to its announcement of Lite Hash Rate (LHR) GeForce RTX 3060 graphics cards. While NVIDIA’s beta 466.24 driver released late last month confirmed that new GPU revisions were on the way, there was no mention of the LHR terminology at that time. Today, however, NVIDIA officially confirmed that its new LHR GPUs will now ship in late May. While the cryptocurrency limiter was first introduced on the GeForce RTX 3060, the new LHR series will extend to the GeForce RTX 3080, GeForce RTX 3070, and GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. All these new LHR cards will have software/hardware controls implemented to slash the Ethereum hash rate in half compared to previous...
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Gigabyte today made its new Lite Hash Rate (LHR) GeForce RTX 3060 cards official. We've heard about upcoming GPU revisions for the GeForce RTX 30 Series with a second-generation Ethereum limiter onboard, but Gigabyte is among the first to post actual product pages confirming the change. NVIDIA's GeForce 466.24 driver confirmed that this change was on the way, stating, "This driver updates the hash limiter for the GeForce RTX 3060 12GB and is required for product shipped starting mid-May." Gigabyte's LHR series is currently limited to its GeForce RTX 3060 family, which includes the following cards: Aorus GeForce RTX 3060 ELITE 12G GeForce RTX 3060 GAMING OC 12G GeForce RTX 3060 VISION OC 12G GeForce...
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Meme coins have been on the rise, with Dogecoin taking off and other cryptocurrencies attempting to follow suit. This has caused some trouble for the rest of the cryptocurrency world as fees have gone up and the legitimate cryptocurrency market is diluted. Now, one of the cofounders of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, has donated $1 billion in meme coins to a COVID-19 relief fund for India, which may have rippling effects. While Buterin donated quite a bit to other charities, the big donation of the bunch is 500 Ethereum, and a whopping 50 trillion SHIB worth roughly $1.14 billion at the time of the transaction was sent to the India Covid-Crypto Relief Fund. The founder of this fund, Sandeep Nailwal,...
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Graphics cards based on NVIDIA's CMP HX GPUs are finally starting to trickle into the marketplace. So far, we've seen entries from ASUS and Gigabyte. Now, MSI is looking to get in on the action with its CMP 30HX Miner XS. Based on previous leaks, the CMP 30HX Miner XS features NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 1660 Super GPU. The card looks like a dead ringer for MSI's GeForce GTX 1660 Super Ventus. The big difference is that the GeForce GTX 1660 Super Ventus has a single HDMI port and three DisplayPort connectors. Given that the CMP 30HX Miner XS doesn't need video outputs since it's dedicated to mining for Ethereum, the I/O plate only features exhaust vents for the coolers. The CMP 30HX Miner XS has 1408...
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As we reported over the weekend, Ethereum has seen a monumental rise in value during the opening months of 2021. Ethereum kicked off the new year valued at $730 and this morning surpassed the $3,000 mark to hit $3,148 (as of this writing). To put this performance in perspective, just a week ago, Ethereum was sitting at $2,500. However, the cryptocurrency likely won't stop here as deVere Group CEO Nigel Green predicts that we could see another massive surge. According to Green, Ethereum could pass $5,000 within the next week. While that comment may have seemed like an outlandish prediction just a few months ago, the current cryptocurrency boom takes a bit of the edge off the skepticism. "Ether...
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Gamers looking to purchase a current-generation graphics card from NVIDIA or AMD at MSRP have found the task damn near impossible. There are several reasons for this phenomenon, including the immense performance that these graphics cards provide in games; the resulting demand from gamers eager to get their hands on one; and the meteoric rise in the value of cryptocurrencies. One cryptocurrency that has been on an incredible run during 2021 is Ethereum, which is at an all-time high. Ethereum is currently sitting at just over $2,900 in value, a nearly 4x increase since the start of 2021. Bitcoin sharply increased its value over the past four months as well. The dominant cryptocurrency entered 2021...
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In recent days, we've heard increasing rumors that NVIDIA will release a new revision GeForce RTX 30 Series "GAxx2" GPUs that feature an enhanced cryptocurrency mining limiter. Today with the release of the GeForce 466.24 driver, NVIDIA confirmed those rumors surrounding a mid-May launch. If you look at the release notes for the GeForce 466.24 driver, you'll find the following passage: "This driver updates the hash limiter for the GeForce RTX 3060 12GB and is required for product shipped starting mid-May." The folks at VideoCardz dug deeper into the new driver and discovered that the latest revision of the GeForce RTX 3060, which will carry the GA106-302 GPU, has a unique Device ID. While the...
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The consensus on the internet seems to be that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and GeForce RTX 3070 Ti will be arriving relatively shortly on the consumer market. However, these new cards won't just bring increased gaming performance compared to the GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3070, respectively; they will also deliver at least two new features. This new round of alleged GAxx2 GPUs will have a revised version of the cryptocurrency mining limiter (which halved Ethereum hash rates) in place, as we've discussed on several occasions. NVIDIA's first-generation crypto limiter introduced with the GeForce RTX 3060 is easily bypassed. Ethereum miners first fooled the limiter using a beta driver provided...
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Ethereum mining seems to be all the rage these days, and companies like NVIDIA are looking to cash in on the crypto mining gold rush. In February, NVIDIA announced its Crypto Mining Processor (CMP) HX family of dedicated Ethereum cards, with hash rates ranging from 26 MH/s for the CMP 30HX up to 80 MH/s for the CMP 90HX. According to NVIDIA, in the middle lays the CMP 40HX, which has a stated hash rate of 36 MH/s. However, the performance of an alleged prototype ASUS CMP 40HX card has been revealed, and it is shaping up to be quite impressive. VideoCardz was sent an image of a rig featuring not one but eight ASUS CMP 40HX cards. And instead of puttering along at the official 36 MH/s hash rate,...
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It is currently a horrible time for enthusiasts looking to build a new gaming rig or upgrade an existing one. Demand far outweighs supply for current- and even previous-generation graphics cards like the GeForce RTX 3080 and the Radeon RX 5700 XT, respectively. We can blame this shortage partially on cryptocurrency miners, who are buying up scores of these GPUs to mine for Ethereum. However, a new application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) is being released to the market that would forgo the need to secure massive amounts of consumer-level GPUs to belt out epic hash rates. Enter the Antminer E9, which has a claimed hash rate of 3 GH/s. For those keeping score, 3 GH/s equals roughly 32 GeForce...
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It looks as though NVIDIA will take another stab at a cryptocurrency mining limiter for its GeForce RTX 3060 after its current solution was defeated via multiple methods. The current GeForce RTX 3060 features the GA106-300 GPU, but a report alleges that a newer revision, GA106-302, is on the way to reenable the limiter. This information reportedly comes from a Taiwanese graphics card manufacturer, which says that NVIDIA has already discontinued the GA106-300. NVIDIA's switch to the GA106-302 thwarts miners on two fronts. First of all, the 470.05 beta driver currently used by Ethereum miners is incompatible with the new GPU revision, which shuts down that popular workaround. HKEPC states that...
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We got our first look at Gigabyte's first NVIDIA CMP HX card back in early March when a single photo leaked. Today, Gigabyte is ready to get official with the cryptocurrency mining card, designated as the NVIDIA CMP 30HX D6 6G (GV-N30HXD6-6G). As we had already surmised, the CMP 30HX D6 6G is based on NVIDIA's Turing TU116-100 GPU. The GPU features 1408 CUDA cores, a boost clock of 1785MHz, and 6GB of 14 Gbps GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit memory bus. There are no video outputs on the card, and it features a WindForce 2X cooling system with counterrotating 90mm fan blades. There's also a composite copper heat pipe to keep the GPU [relatively] cool. Not surprisingly, given the stresses that these cards...
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It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that cryptocurrencies are soaring to new highs. The valuation increases have also brought in a wealth of individuals and companies looking to cash in by mining for cryptocurrencies like Ethereum with GPUs that gamers would have otherwise bought. The huge cryptocurrency run culminated today with a cumulative valuation topping $2 trillion. Not surprisingly, Bitcoin and Ethereum make up the bulk of that $2 trillion figure, with the former hitting a 24-hour high of $58,243 with a total market cap of $1.10 trillion. Ethereum, on the other hand, had a 24-hour high of $2,118 with a market cap of $244.38 billion. Rounding out the top five cryptocurrencies...
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Cryptocurrency is slowly but surely growing in popularity with a broader global audience. Now that Elon Musk has begun to accept Bitcoin for Tesla purchases, that trend is only going to continue. As such, PayPal is jumping on the bandwagon of accepting crypto as a payment method for anything. Perhaps people will finally convert and have a use for all that Dogecoin they bought this year. Announced today, PayPal’s “Checkout With Crypto” feature will allow users to use their cryptocurrency at millions of businesses that support PayPal payments in the coming months. This builds on PayPal customers’ ability to buy, sell, and hold cryptocurrency with their PayPal wallets, allowing...
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